Which to use
“show” is a verb and “spot” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #199
- “show” frequency rank
- #1,377
- “spot” frequency rank
- 1576
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | show | spot |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To display, to have somebody see (something). | A round or irregular patch on the surface of a thing having a different color, texture etc. and generally round in shape. |
Where the eye mixes show and spot
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: show is /ʃəʊ/ while spot is /spɒt/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1576, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
show is recorded at frequency rank #199, classified as averb, pronounced /ʃəʊ/. spot is at rank #1,377, tagged as anoun, pronounced /spɒt/.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 1576, this pair ranks #527,141 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of show vs spot
Shared letters: os. Private to "show": hw. Private to "spot": pt.
"show" · 4 letters · shape CCVC · "spot" · 4 letters · shape CCVC